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| Description | Humphrey Bogart seems to play one character, but he does it so well. This is a tight and tense thriller that feels like you are in the theater watching the play. The noir setting, lighting, and camera work are stunning but unobtrusive. You skulk around the setting, like someone trapped in the humid, languid air of boiling Florida Keys summer evening. The acting, all around, it great. Edward Robinson is amazing as monstrous mob boss. He bounces between ruthless and menacing, to bragging and vulgar, to simpering and pathetic; and all back again in minutes. He portrays the sleazy bully who is the big man when he has a gun and people to follow orders. All the mistakes or problems are someone else's fault and he cringes when anyone stands up to him. If you didn't know better, you would think Robinson was modeling it after Trump. In that sense, the movie is more timely than ever. It tells the story of down and out Americans who believe in the American way. They came back from WWII worse for wear, but believed that we did the right thing because America doesn't believe in gangster bosses, bullies, or people who pray on the weak. They stand up to his lies, his self aggrandizement, his threats of violence. No one in the movie is flawless, but they show an old Hollywood fable of flawed heroes facing their demons and rejecting the temptations of false easy ways out. |